"johnnie howell" is the pen name of John H. Hicks Jr. which he used for seven and one half years on a weekly newspaper column, "There. I said it!, " Two early events shaped his life, on Resurrection Sunday (Easter) in 1936 he received the Lord Jesus as his Savior. After being drafted he was stationed at Fort Belvoir and met Anna Wright of Martins Ferry, Ohio on July 23, 1943. They were married on September 25th, of that year.
He was sent to Europe with the 61st. Engineer Combat Battalion to serve in Normandy, Northern France, Ardennes (Battle of the Bulge as an Infantryman), Rhineland, and Central Europe. They returned to Louisville where he enrolled as Pre-Med student at the U of L. During the following three years and three months, prior to graduation, his wife gave birth to a daughter and a son and he built them a home, beginning a part-time career in construction. He was a substitute teacher for a year. They moved to Greenville South Carolina for two years when he enrolled in the Graduate School of Religion at Bob Jones University. An elective course in Evangelistic Song Leading was instrumental as he served in about 40 revivals after they returned to Louisville.
His wife soon gave birth to a daughter and in four years a second son. He worked various jobs; builder, farmer, rental property manager, radio newsman and ad writer, developed a subdivision, real estate sales, construction manager for 2 architectural firms, the school board, and satisfied a war time ambition...learning to fly. He received 2 patents on football face masks and was the Speaker/Teacher at the Louisville Bible Church for 2 years.
